Fake Facebook Ad

Fake Facebook Ad

“A malicious advertisement has been found within an application for Facebook that redirects users to fake antivirus software, according to a security researcher. The banner advertisement for greeting cards is intermittently displayed with an application called Farm Town, which has more than 9 million monthly users according to information published on Facebook. If the bad Shockwave Flash advertisement is displayed, the user is redirected from Facebook through several domains and ends up on a Web site selling fake antivirus software, said Sandi Hardmeier, who studies malicious advertisements and blogged about the issue.(See also “How to Remove Fake AV Software.“)” Says PC World. You can read the full artcile here.

The Ad itself is said to be harmless but it is highly recommended that users NOT click on any of the ads claiming to clean their system. It’s sort of funny that they have to inform people not to click on malicious content.

Hackers and Malicious code writers have been getting more and more insidious for years. I have worked in the IT field for a little over five years now and I can honestly say that the methods used by hackers to dupe unsuspecting people into installing their malicious software are incredibly clever. The most prevalent cases I see are people who believe the popups that show up. “The message said I was infected so I installed the software and paid for it.” said customer. The sad thing is most people who pay for the software never get their money back. The most amusing case I saw was a lady who brought her Mac in. She said “I think I have a virus can you check it out?” I of course said yes and sat down and studied the laptop and went straight for her “documents directory. Inside I found 18 copies of antivirus2009.exe. The lady had tried to install a windows virus on her machine 18 consecutive times. This just goes to show how little attention people pay to what pops up in front of them.

I think if you posted a pop that said “If you click here you will DIE!” in big red letters and sent it out to 100 people that 75 of them would be dead. It never ceases to amaze me to how little attention people pay to their surroundings.